


sleepsong

by everender



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Drunk Rey, F/M, Semi-Drunk Kylo Ren
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-01-06
Packaged: 2019-03-01 02:47:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13285332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/everender/pseuds/everender
Summary: "She wakes up the next morning dizzy and a little unsure of how she made it under the covers. "Three times they catch each other drinking and one time they drink together. One-shot.





	sleepsong

The change in the air is palpable.

It was only a small victory  - they had driven out First Order soldiers from an old Resistance base, on a planet a little too remote to be of significant use - but after so much training, waiting; after so much time of their spirits sinking, there is a tangible warmth in the air. 

They are back on their base - or the closest thing they have to one; a partially dilapidated remnant of the previous war, and one they will likely need to leave soon anyway - and Rey watches as everyone goes about dressing injuries and starting meal prep, a lightness to their steps. 

Poe walks into the mess hall. His gaze is focused as it flits from person to person, until his eyes land on her and he suddenly brightens. 

He approaches her, carrying a sense of excitement about him. "I found some bottles of Corellian whiskey," he says, his voice low. "Not enough for everyone, though, so I've been tapping people." He winks at the last part. 

The only alcohol Rey has ever had was some homemade stuff that might as well have been poison, given to her on occasion by Unkar Plutt. Sometimes, if she brought him something particularly valuable, he would offer a few sips, and she'd only drink it herself if she saw one of his customers sip at it first. Its taste was wretched but Rey found it helped her sleep easier. 

"I'm in," Rey says. 

Poe smiles wider. "Conference room. Ten minutes."

Rey is there in twelve, and when she reaches the room - tucked into a hallway far enough away that the others won't hear the noise - there are already more than a dozen people inside; glasses of whatever Poe said he secured in their hands.

"Rey!" Finn is suddenly in front of her, engulfing her in a hug. His arms are heavy around her and she laughs. 

"You're already drunk," she says, amazed.

"He's had three shots." Rose's voice comes from somewhere behind them. She looks at Finn in disbelief, and underneath it, a strong current of affection. 

Finn cracks a smile and wraps an arm around Rose. "Not much alcohol for Stormtroopers in the First Order."

Poe brings her her first drink of the night and she downs the glass. It takes three more before she is laughing freely, watching Finn and Rose - who turns out to be not so much better than Finn, becoming unsteady at four drinks - try to tell the group gathered around them what happened in Canto Bight. 

Later, Rey steps into her room, pleasantly dizzy, and is just about to settle into her covers when she feels a tug in the Force. She turns her head on her pillow and sees a dark figure sitting cross-legged by the doorway. 

"Ben," she says, and feels her lips stretch across her teeth in a smile. 

She climbs out of bed clumsily and traces her way to him, a strange sense of urgency guiding her forward. Once she's standing right in front of him, about a foot away, she realizes she doesn't know what to say. 

"I haven't seen you in a while," she manages finally, wanting to hear his reply; his voice. 

He looks up briefly, mildly surprised at the sound of her voice, and she realizes she might have said his name in her head earlier. She's not entirely sure. 

"I hope you enjoyed your little victory," he says. His tone is unconcerned. Almost peaceful. 

Rey sits down clumsily and her hands graze his legs as she settles. The touch sears and she's careful to scoot back a few inches, hands holding her knees. 

His eyes are open now, searching hers. 

"You've been drinking." It's not a question, and there's something like amusement in his voice.

Rey wonders for a moment if she should deny it but her tongue is quicker than her mind. "Corellian whiskey. It was vile." She almost prefers Unkar Plutt's moonshine. 

"Your hands."

She glances down at the backs of them and at the angry red streaks mottling her skin. She vaguely remembers someone knocking over a bottle and her trying to pick up the pieces with her bare hands.

"They're shallow cuts. It's nothing."

"You should clean them," he says. 

"I'll wash them off," she agrees. She gets to her feet, pointedly avoiding his knees, and goes to the bathroom; returning back to her spot in front of him moments later. 

"Rey." 

"What?" she snaps, immediately defensive at the amusement in his voice. 

"Your hands."

She glances down again and they're the same as before. 

"Oh."

Ben stands up in one smooth motion. "I'll be back."

Her eyes fall closed and she only opens them when she hears a soft rustle as he settles back in front of her. There's a white ribbon of gauze in his lap and a damp strip of cloth in his hand. 

He gingerly takes her hand in his, and when his fingertips brush her palms - looking for purchase - her blood turns to wine. He runs the cool cloth over the cuts and Rey is acutely aware of each sting. After the blood is washed off, he wraps gauze around one cut on her left hand that won't quite stop bleeding, his touch light. 

"You should rest," he says. 

Rey nods and closes her eyes, content to sleep right where she is. Ben lets out a breath and Rey doesn't know if she's imagining the hint of laughter in the sound. 

"Rey," he says, standing up. "Come, let's get you to bed."

Rey makes a noise of protest. The floor is cool to the touch, and she feels heavy-

Ben holds out a hand and she takes it somewhat reluctantly, almost knocking into his chest as she hoists herself up. Once she's on her feet she decides she won't make it to the bed after all and settles back down on the floor; laying her cheek against the tile. She swears she hears Ben chuckle, the sound eliciting a smile of her own, and then her mind goes hazy, 

She wakes up the next morning dizzy and a little unsure of how she made it under the covers. 

 

xxx 

 

He swirls the wine in his glass, the alcohol doing little to settle his fraying temper. The throne room is empty; bare after he ordered everyone out, to let him think.  He closes his eyes in a drunken attempt at meditation and feels someone approaching him. 

"Your friends are becoming quite a pain," he says. The Resistance has managed to pick off small bases under the First Order's control; in areas where they've been stretched thin. 

"I'm glad," she says simply. Her voice is far away and then her next words are suddenly too close. "It that the only reason you're drinking?"

He opens his eyes and she is standing a few feet away.

"Your thoughts are slower." 

He takes the last sip of wine - the last of the glass and two bottles' worth - and it makes his next words come out easier; smoother.

"You're standing in my throne room," he says. 

_Don't go this way._

_Join me._ Their last conversation in-person echoes through his mind.  _Please-_

Her gaze trails around the room, and he wonders what she sees. 

"Do you ever regret it?" he asks. "The choice you made?" 

Her eyes snap to his. "I gave you a choice, too."

They had both been so convinced in that elevator that they would walk out together. 

He stands and steps down, closer to her. He sees her breath hitch when he stops close enough that their chests are nearly touching. Slowly, his blood languid, he reaches out and tucks a stray lock of hair behind her ear.

His tongue is thoroughly loosened. "I was ready to come for you, too. I would've done anything if I had known where you were." 

Her eyes are closed now, her mouth parted, and he traces his thumb along her lower lip. He blinks and she is gone. 

 

xxx

 

"Why are you outside?"

Rey sits with her elbows braced on her knees. The ground is mossy; concealing the rocks beneath - she comes to this spot to meditate every morning, but she gets the sense that she will have to find another after tonight.

She turns to look at him. He is standing a little ways off, wearing a loose tunic and trousers; his arms bare and hair wet. She quickly turns away, her stomach clenching. 

"How do you know?" She'd willed the words to come out crisp but they are softened around the edges; slower than they should be. 

"Your hair," he says, and she instinctively reaches out for it, finding the strands caught in the wind. "You've been drinking again."

She remembers that the last time he had seen her like this, there was a half-smile on his lips, but his voice now holds a trace of concern. 

"You don't need to worry about me," she snaps. 

He approaches her slowly and sits down next to her, his pale skin a stark contrast to the growing night. "Where are your friends?" he asks gently. 

"Don't patronize me." There is the threat of tears as her voice tapers off at the end and he is silent; not saying anything as she presses her forehead against her propped arms. Her cheeks flush. This is not the way she wants him to see her, in a stupor and fighting tears. 

"It's okay," he says softly.

She feels like she should be angry - she's not sure at who; herself for letting the thought be broadcast into the Force, or him for reading it and responding. Or- 

"You know, I think this is the closest I've ever been to my parents," she says, biting out a bitter laugh. She will not cry for them. Never again. "Full of cheap liquor. Out of my mind."

Everyone else is inside the base, celebrating another small takeover and an alliance with a small group of rebels on a nearby planet. She had tried to drink in celebration but that little pocket of darkness that sometimes clouds her had grown stronger, and here she is; her heart aching for people she has never known. 

"They did not deserve you," Ben says simply, and she feels him look to her but she keeps her eyes straight ahead. "You have always been more than them." There is a quiet intensity to his voice, and Rey shivers. 

He is so close and so  _warm._ She leans in instinctively, the air around her cold enough to sting; her cheek flushed where it presses against his bare arm.  

 

xxx

 

He holds a bottle between them. 

"Corellian wine," he says. "I thought you should try something besides hard alcohol."

She is sitting on her bed, feeling at as peace as she could be expected to for the first time in a while. The First Order and Resistance are in a stand-off. The Resistance has enough bases, planets, and allies to be more than just a simple pain, and Rey can feel something like Crait looming in the future; the vague shape of its chaos. 

The bottle feels like a strange sort of apology, or a parting gift. 

Rey feels her mouth twist up in a small smile. She stands up and takes the wine from his outstretched hand, popping the top easily. It's sweet-smelling and a deep, translucent red. 

The first sip is almost cloyingly sweet, and on the second she thinks she can taste some sort of fruit. She passes the bottle back to him, marveling at how her throat doesn't burn. 

They end up sitting across from each other on the ground, the wine in a wordless rotation between the two. When the bottle is half-full, the alcohol has finally set into Rey's veins; making her head the tiniest bit lighter.

She traces the label on the bottle's face, and asks, "Have you ever been to Corellia?"

He is silent for a few heartbeats, and Rey wonders if she's overstepped; asking about his father's home, but he says, "A few times. Diplomatic trips."

He tells her a story, then, his voice slow and tentative, of standing between his parents on a balcony during an address. He'd wanted to get a closer look at the crowd and pushed his head through the railings; getting stuck there.   
  
The image is ridiculous and a laugh escapes Rey. "How'd you get out?" 

"They had to bend apart the rails," he says, an almost-smile on his lips. "There's still a scar somewhere under my hair."

Rey's hand twitches for a moment, tempted to reach and part the dark mass herself, but she stops herself. Instead, she tells him about how she had once knocked into a shelf back in the AT-AT, and a pot had shattered against her head. She had walked around mildly concussed for days, and can still feel a slight dent on her scalp where it had landed. 

"You kept plants?" 

"Flowers, mostly. Spinebarrels and some cacti," she says. It was comforting to have something living in the AT-AT with her; something to take care of. 

She might be imagining it but his expression softens, and he tells her another story from when he was younger; something about an encounter with a serving droid on Borleias that led to a dropped plate and a slash on his shoulder. They exchange stories until Rey is sure she can trace a map of scars on his flesh, and her cheeks heat at the thought of her hands on his bare skin.

The bottle is empty now - Ben had taken the last, long swig - and she feels herself shifting closer to him with every word; their knees overlapping. 

"What about this?" Rey asks. She touches a small, silvery slash across the knuckles of his right hand. 

He glances down at where her fingers lie on his skin and then looks her directly in the eyes. She feels all of the air leave her chest and the room is suddenly too small; pushing them closer. 

He gives her an answer, his breath fanning over her, but she doesn't hear the words. She interlaces their fingers and warmth floods her skin. His other hand goes to rest on her knee and she remembers his thumb on her mouth; remembers the acute need to have his lips replace his hand. 

The air is suddenly too hot. Rey's grip on his hand tightens instinctively. "Ben, I-"

He bends down and kisses her. 

His lips are softer than she expected and he kisses her with a bruising force; the hand on her knee sliding up to grip her waist. Rey's stomach drops when he tugs her closer to him and she all but falls into his lap, the alcohol making her clumsy. 

She parts her mouth and he catches her lower lip between his teeth; biting on it so softly that Rey can't help the moan that leaves her lips. She feels his hands tighten around her at the sound. 

Their kisses grow almost frantic, sloppier; Rey's mind heady from both the wine and the dizzying feeling of Ben's lips on her mouth, jaw, neck. She fists her hands in his hair, tilting her head back and letting out embarrassing little gasps when he bites at her skin. 

He pulls back for a moment and Rey almost whines, but feels her stomach drop out when she sees that his eyes are nearly black. Her legs clench around his hips and she feels him underneath her thigh; hard. 

His hands slip underneath her tunic; tracing a heated path over her bare stomach, and when his fingers ghost over her breasts Rey pulls back. Her hips roll against his at the motion and he groans out her name, the sound almost breaking her resolve. 

She kisses him once more, gently this time - tasting the wine on his breath - before pulling back entirely. He looks almost pained, lips swollen and cheeks red; hair matted at the edges by sweat. 

_I want to remember this when it happens._

The thought hangs in the air between them and he nods almost imperceptibly. He pulls her back to him and presses his lips to her temple, and the Force must have sensed a shift, because just as she is about to settle her head against him he is gone.

Rey lies back onto the floor, willing the cold tiles to cool her heated skin.


End file.
